Days when you can get a ticket to ride

IT WAS 1989 and there we were, quite sure that by the end of the day we were going to be richer by a four-wheel drive vehicle or perhaps a car or a video machine or a computer or something like that.

In the office there was a hub of excitement as those with tickets in the Beacon Bay Round Table Everyone’s a Winner competition fantasised about the prize they thought they were going to win.

After all, everyone was going to be a winner – of sorts.

This type of draw had caught on in East London with the Buffalo Club’s version about the best known. Tickets were quite pricey at R140 a time, but then the prizes were big too. Top of the list were 4WD vehicles, cars, television sets and home appliances as well as one cash prize of R10 000.

It was way back in those days when this type of entertainment caught the public’s imagination and although R140 was quite a lot of money then, it bought a lot more than it does today.

Imagine, a 4-wheel drive bakkie and in addition a car too. It was hard to resist taking a ticket.

It was all in the name of charity and every one of 2 500 tickets was sold, which was the limit, and the tidy sum of R350 000 was collected.

It looked quite attractive. You never knew, you m-i-g-h-t just be numbers – someone calculated one was drawn every 17 seconds to be sure of finishing by 9pm.

By keeping the big prizes until last, the organisers were assured of a captive audience for most of the day with just the odd big prize thrown in every so often to hold interest.

That really spun it out for the stallholders and sideshows to build the whole thing up into a fitting climax.

Everyone’s a Winner was true in a sense because everyone won something, but winning big was really what most people were looking for. Unfortunately, like most things in life, you got nothing for nothing and this was a very worthy fundraising cause.

It was with that in mind that people willingly parted with R140 and hoped for the best.

Which made it a little different from the old Pick a Box show on Springbok Radio when they used to tell you there were “more big prizes than booby prizes”.

When we got down to the Orient there was a hope that the Chiels’ number hadn’t come up yet because if it hadn’t been drawn, that would mean we were still in the running for one of the big prizes.

Inside the huge marquee all 2 500 numbers were on a board stretching the length of the tent.

Round Tablers were calling them out while others put crosses through each number that came up and wrote down the prize won. On most were booby prizes – “meal”, or “whisky” with the occasional entry “video” or “TV” or something like that.

What was ours going to be? We squeezed through the pressing throng, eager to see if our number had been drawn. It had, and across it was written “whisky”.

We didn’t mind, it would be a way to drown sorrows! As they say, if you don’t speculate, you can’t accumulate.

We settled down on one of the benches overlooking the Orient Beach and munched our hamburgers bought at the Lions stall while the NSRI and Amatola Rescue Services went through their paces.

It’s hard to believe that the R350 000 could buy a prize for everyone. I mean a 4-wheel drive bakkie will set you back at least R500 000 today, and a small car around R150 000. What’s more the bottle of whisky I won would be close to the R140 ticket price now, it probably sold for around R20 then.

Tickets would have to be around R1 000 each today to cover prizes. I wonder if people now would gamble on that. I doubt it. —